According to a recent report from the MIT Technology Review, a woman’s Roomba robot vacuum cleaner recently took photos of her on the toilet and somehow the photos ended up on Facebook, shared by gig workers in a foreign country.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and five members of the House of Representatives are calling on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to block Amazon’s proposed acquisition of iRobot, the company that produces the popular Roomba cleaning robots.
The FTC has launched an investigation into tech giant Amazon’s proposed $1.7 billion purchase of iRobot, the company behind Roomba. The acquisition has raised privacy concerns as it may give the e-commerce giant the ability to map customers’ houses.
More than two dozen groups that are critical of Amazon’s anti-competitive practices and surveillance capitalism have urged the FTC to block Amazon’s acquisition of iRobot, which develops Roomba vacuum cleaners. According to the coalition, “Allowing Amazon to absorb a competing smart home device business with access to incredibly detailed consumer data would endanger fair competition and open markets while also jeopardizing consumer privacy.”
The maker of the Roomba robotic vacuum has filed a lawsuit against a startup company called SharkNinja, claiming it is infringing on its patents for smart home cleaning devices. According to iRobot, which manufactures the Roomba, SharkNinja rushed “its copycat product in time for the holiday season.”
